Our Bea Face Injury

Poor Belle, looks as though she's got a collection of fluid that needs draining? :huggles: to Belle

Looks like anti biotics needed.Is that from her bite Pat ?

Think that needs a phone call to the vet Pat, looks like an infection to me.

I wouldn't muck about, think she needs some antibiotics

When she was bitten on 29th Nov. we took her to vets who cleaned it up, gave her a painkiller and an anti biotic injection.

She had Synulox tablets for 10 days after that. No sign of infection, healed up o.k. except when she rubbed the scabs off!!!

Went to vet again on 14 th December as this fluid filled lump had appeared. Vets says leave it alone unless it grows big or

gets infected, as draining it could interfere with saliva glands.

Not sure what to do.?

Poor Belle :wub: it's takening a long time to heal pat , bless her give her a hug from me :wub:

If it is simply from the injury, I would leave it for the moment, my beagle had a similar injury, the swelling is simply due to a build up of blood serum and will either dry up on it's own after slowly hardening or if there is a scab, it will come out and the wound slowly heal from inside. This took about fours and a half weeks with our dog and the swelling got quite large before subsiding.

The only time I would take the dog to the vet is if you are in any doubt as to whether it is still just a tissue injury.....if it is something called a salivary mucocele, where the salivary gland itself has been damaged, then the swelling is due to saliva draining into the face as it has nowhere else to go.....this doesn't constitute an emergency but will require treatment eventually.

with a salivary mucocele, the lump will be very uniform and even and what drains from the lump will be quite thick and sticky,whereas blood serum will be much thinner.....either way I wouldn't worry too much but pooch will need treatment for a mucocele as they don't generally cure themselves....

Hi Pat, thanks for posting piks :thumbsup:

Looks like she's got bitten straight through the sublingual salivary gland (run it through Google for some anatomy piks)

I'm inclined to agree with the vet to wait and see what your left with. There are 3 stages to healing, time wise she's in stage 2 still (proliferation) This is where the damaged tissue is proliferated with cells which repair it with scarring and that scarring becomes more 'organised' in its structure. As she moves about, eats, drinks, stretches etc, any adhesions or excessive scarring that's tethered the wound also frees up further reducing the scar build up.

Stage 3 happens over around 6 months. The scar itself remodels and becomes stronger. Generally, what your left with after that is what she'll be left with for good.

Because of its location being not so far from where the jugular vein branches off, I'd personally only want a vet to go in if it was becoming ridiculously large or a persistent infection. To be honest even if it was becoming ridiculously large, I'd still prefer them to drain it off with a syringe rather than go jumping in and give her anti-biotics.

There is one big merit to leaving it during this scarring phase as well. Whilst the lump is unsightly, it is not becoming infective which makes me feel she's got some flow from the gland to her mouth. This implies to me that the duct (tube from the gland coming to her mouth) still has some function albeit a weak one because the gland is filling up. However, that build up of pressure will probably give the duct the best chance of remaining open and hopefully any possible adhesions that are restricting flow will smooth down to a minimum.

Just wondered if the vet has tried expressing the gland to see if there's a flow? Tbh, it would be difficult to do whilst awake because the duct comes out underneath the tongue however, with a build up of saliva, it tends to be very salty and the dog tends to react to the taste in their mouth. You may well notice this yourself if your massaging under her chin in a direction towards her mouth. It can also flow spontaneously at feeding times due to an increase in saliva so keep an eye out as its useful to know.

Hope this helps and reassures you a little.

Whippets Rule said:

with a salivary mucocele, the lump will be very uniform and even and what drains from the lump will be quite thick and sticky,whereas blood serum will be much thinner.....either way I wouldn't worry too much but pooch will need treatment for a mucocele as they don't generally cure themselves....

Click to expand...

I know of 4 dogs where spontaneous resolution has occurred. Vickys maid u luck, our own True Faith, another racer who I can't recall at the mo and interestingly Pats other dog Midas.

I know of literally hundreds of human patients who've been scheduled for surgery only to present on the day with them gone and I know of many, many more who've undergone what's known as a sialogram whereby the duct has a radiopaque dye injected in to acquire an xray image of the gland. During the procedure, the duct is in itself dilated by the fine needles used and this dilation widens the duct enough to maintain a free flow of saliva, thus resolving the what was once blocked mucocele.

I'm unaware of such a procedure existing in veterinary surgery though as the patient also needs to have their salivary gland stimulated whilst awake by giving things like lemon drinks / sweets etc.

Imo, I'd say around 20% of salivary gland mucoceles have surgery, Those that do usually have some abnormal pathology within the gland or a stone (the latter can also be retrieved in a much less invasive procedure if it has formed within the duct)

The big issue I have with surgery particularly in areas such as saliva glands is there is a lot of delicate anatomy around that can very easily become damaged through no fault of the vet or the surgeon. The tissues themselves are poorly defined and there are a number of very important nerves involved with other functions that tend to run straight through some of these glands. For this reason, I wouldn't want anyone jumping in unless its the rock bottom, last resort especially when given a chance, they can resolve on their own.

wild whippies said:

Whippets Rule said:

with a salivary mucocele, the lump will be very uniform and even and what drains from the lump will be quite thick and sticky,whereas blood serum will be much thinner.....either way I wouldn't worry too much but pooch will need treatment for a mucocele as they don't generally cure themselves....

Click to expand...

I know of 4 dogs where spontaneous resolution has occurred. Vickys maid u luck, our own True Faith, another racer who I can't recall at the mo and interestingly Pats other dog Midas.

I know of literally hundreds of human patients who've been scheduled for surgery only to present on the day with them gone and I know of many, many more who've undergone what's known as a sialogram whereby the duct has a radiopaque dye injected in to acquire an xray image of the gland. During the procedure, the duct is in itself dilated by the fine needles used and this dilation widens the duct enough to maintain a free flow of saliva, thus resolving the what was once blocked mucocele.

I'm unaware of such a procedure existing in veterinary surgery though as the patient also needs to have their salivary gland stimulated whilst awake by giving things like lemon drinks / sweets etc.

Imo, I'd say around 20% of salivary gland mucoceles have surgery, Those that do usually have some abnormal pathology within the gland or a stone (the latter can also be retrieved in a much less invasive procedure if it has formed within the duct)

The big issue I have with surgery particularly in areas such as saliva glands is there is a lot of delicate anatomy around that can very easily become damaged through no fault of the vet or the surgeon. The tissues themselves are poorly defined and there are a number of very important nerves involved with other functions that tend to run straight through some of these glands. For this reason, I wouldn't want anyone jumping in unless its the rock bottom, last resort especially when given a chance, they can resolve on their own.

Click to expand...

was only sharing my experience and offering my opinion....don't believe I suggested surgery either...but clearly there are vets on here and I'll not make this mistake again....

:wub: From my experience, it looks to me as if the Salivery Gland has been distressed in some way, and, in my opinion, I would leave well alone, for the time being. These glands can often get blocked or distressed in a variety of ways and any vet worth his bill would tell you to wait and see what happens. I, myself had a bitch, years ago, whos gland would just fill up, without ant trauma being inflicted. My vet told me that I should leave it as, it had filled up on it's own and, would more than likely, drain on it's own. He was right and, she raced all her life with this "problem" and no-one was the wiser. Don't be so quick to resort to the knife, when it's only o "cosmetic" problem. When the gland is full, it will drain. Check it daily and, only have it drained if it become "grainy" to the touch. Hope this helps! :luck: :wub:

looks nasty,hope she makes a full recovery :luck: :luck: :luck:

Thanks for opinions and advise. Belle has been to vets twice and he said leave well alone for the moment.

Keep and eye on it and come back if it goes hard, grows bigger or gets infected.

Have been down this road before as Jac says, with Midas. He had a swollen face on one side, like mumps.!

Blocked saliva glands were diognosed. Vet said again to leave alone for a few weeks, then would drain if no better.

Thankfully the problem disappeared on its own.

Belle is fighting fit (bad choice of words as thats why she is in this state) She is eating like a horse and at the moment

is gnawing on her bone. Think I will take her with me next week when Frank goes for his booster so vet can check it.

Thanks everyone. xx

My vet didn't seem to think there was a high success rate with having it operated on. Ziggy had his for a good 10 months or so and his swelling extended from under his neck (the size of a tennis ball at times) and right round to under his ear/cheek at one side. We had it drained & bandaged a few times with no change, he was given a cortisone injection in the last instance and swelling reduced about a month later.

Thanks for pics Vicky. Its seems this problem is more common than I thought. Belle's lump is quite small compared with Ziggy's.

Hope he is o.k. now. xx

all you want at this time of the year.hope every thing goes ok :luck: :luck: :luck:

I know this is an old thread, but has the lump gone down yet?

I have a similar problem with one of mine.

Sorry to hear you have problem with your dog. Everything was back to normal in a few weeks.

I think chewing on her bone helped it dissapear and one of the other dogs kept it clean for her.!!!

Hope all goes well. I had some good advice from friends on here, all I can add would be to keep an eye

on it in case of infection. (Does it smell o.k ?)